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Quicken Classic for Win - OL-295-A Errors at Vanguard

DisplacedHoosier

Not able to connect to Vanguard on any of my accounts. I see a pinned post referomg to Quicken for Mac, but this seems to be occuring on PC as well. On latest version of Quicken (R61.20). Issue started today (2/20/25).

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download transactions

One Step Update

Accepted answers

Quicken Anja

Hello All,

This is now considered a known issue, though we do not have an ETA on resolution at this time. While the investigation remains ongoing, please refer to this Community Alert for any and all available updates and information.

We apologize for any inconvenience in the meantime! Thank you.

Boatnmaniac

Vanguard has blocked all direct connect connections while they fix an issue with it. This affects all financial softwares that use Direct Connect to download transactions. See this Alert: UPDATE 2/25/25 Vanguard OL-295-A and Error 16503.

In addition, you might want to read through and bookmark this discussion thread on regarding this issue: Re: Quicken Classic for Win - OL-295-A Errors at Vanguard.

There is a way you can download transactions: Use the Web Connect method. WC is where you log into your online account and then manually download and import your transactions from there. There are a few posts in that thread confirming that this works and some of them provide some tips on how to successfully use WC with Vanguard.

Does this answer your question?

Boatnmaniac

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20480009#Comment_20480009

I think others have said you need deactivate your Vanguard account(s) and then do Add Account selecting direct connect as the connection option. To do this, type in Vanguard in Add Account. Then click on Advanced Options…NOT on Next.

Then click on Direct Connect and then on Next. Follow the prompts to complete the setup of DC, making sure to Link the downloaded data to the correct Vanguard account(s) already in Quicken.

Jim_Harman

[revised 3/27]

Here is a summary of the steps needed to reconnect your Vanguard accounts.. Some of these steps may not be necessary in every case, but I want to cover as many bases as possible.

Back up your data file in case something goes wrong.
Go to Edit > Preferences > Investments and make sure the "Default to Simple investing for new accounts" box is not checked.
Go to Edit > Preferences > Downloaded transactions and un-check the "Automatically add to investment transaction lists" box if it is not already un-checked. This will give you a chance to review any new transactions to make sure there are no duplicates and the transactions are going to the correct accounts.
Go to each problem account, click on the gear at the top right and select Edit account details. Make a note of the account name and the Vanguard account number. For accounts that have been connected for many years, you may need to use old account numbers that begin with 2 digits and a V rather than the current 8 digit numbers when re-linking the accounts. If you downloaded transactions using Web Connect (QFX) during the outage, your account numbers may have been changed to the new numbers. If in doubt, open a backup from before the outage, record the correct account numbers, and then return to your working file.
Now for each problem account, click on the gear at the top right, select Edit account details, and then the Online Services tab. If it says the account is set up for transaction download, click on Deactivate. Do not click on “Set up now” after deactivating, you must go through the following steps.
Go to the General tab and now you should be able to select Complete mode. Select that.
At the top of the Accounts bar, usually on the left side of your screen, where all of your accounts are listed, click on the plus sign. This should open the Add account window. Don't worry, you will not be adding any accounts, you will be linking your current Vanguard accounts in Quicken to the corresponding online accounts.
Enter Vanguard and you should see the Vanguard logo on the right. Below the logo, click on Advanced options. Read the permission screen about Quicken and Intuit and click on Continue.
Under How should Quicken connect, select Direct Connect. Click on Next.
Provide your Vanguard username and password, and check the Save to Password Vault if that is how you normally operate. Click on Next.
You will see a list of all your Vanguard accounts. Any accounts that are already connected will be marked Don't add to Quicken. Accounts that you can connect will have entry boxes. For your existing problem accounts DO NOT SELECT THE DEFAULT OF ADD TO QUICKEN. Instead, select Link to existing account and select the Quicken account to use. Do not guess here. If you don't know which account to select or there are Vanguard accounts that you don't want to track, select Don't add to Quicken and only do the accounts you are sure of. You can pick up at step 7 later and reconnect any other accounts later if necessary.
Click on Cancel if you are confused at this point and your accounts will not be re-linked. If you are satisfied, click on Done and your accounts should be set.
Check to make sure any downloaded transactions are going to the correct accounts.

If you have attempted to update while the accounts were in Simple mode, you may see Added or Removed transactions during that time. You will need to delete these. If there are problems, restore the backup file you saved and you will be back to where you started.

Please let us know if this works for you.

All comments

AndrewQ

If it helps I had a similar problem when I tried to do this my first time. I ended up restoring my Quicken file from the last good backup I had, and it seemed to have worked.

Enttauschung

Working as before and I did not need to change any settings from before 2/20/2025. For me no reactivation required.

hansenb40

So, on the 4th try I deactivated the account and then from the properties tried to relink it. In the wizard when it asked for the credentials for Vanguard I hit the back button and it allowed me to pick the institution (vanguard) and in the advanced option I could pick direct connect (it was already selected). I had to do what I described twice, since the first time clicking on advanced just took me the credential screen. I still say there's a bug. But, I seem to be good now.

Boatnmaniac

(Deleted comment. The user already resolved the issue.)

Jim_Harman

My experience was as follows:

On the first try, 4 of the 6 accounts I had originally been downloading via Direct Connect downloaded successfully. As expected, there were no new transactions. There were also no duplicates. The other two accounts gave OL-304 "not recognized" errors.

One of the bad accounts was a very old brokerage account that had originally used an old Pershing account number beginning with 44V for Direct Connect. In order to do the Web Connect QFX download, I had to change this account number in Quicken to the new 8 digit VBS account number. To get the Direct Connect download to work again, I had to change the number back to the old 44V number.

The other "not recognized" account is one I am no longer using and it has had a zero balance since December of 2023. I was not able to reconnect to that account, but because it is empty, I went to Account Details > Online Services and deactivated the account.

So after jumping through some hoops, I am now a happy camper again.

Thanks, Vanguard!

hansenb40

Oh, believe me I understand…. I was using setup now from the account properties page and I was not given the option to select the connection type. I'm good now, thanks for your help.

Frith

I use Quicken for Windows running under Parallels on a Mac M4 with OSX 15.4 Beta 2.

Until today the direct connection between Vanguard and Quicken did not work.

This afternoon I updated my accounts and the Vanguard worked. Not sure this signals that the problem is fixed.

Bob_L

Back to normal…Thx Vanguard! Figured out my previous problem where vanguard had disappeared from OSU since one account would not work when direct connect came back. Turned out I had been sloppy adding accounts, sometimes with my userID and sometimes with my wife's id. We both have access to each others accounts so I think that was causing the problems. Changed all of my accounts to use the same user IDs and all is well!🤪

Pacifica Bob

Boatnmaniac If I had been clever and simply followed your instructions, I would not have had the pleasure of unintentionally setting up my Vanguard account for "Simple - Positions Only" tracking method. Whadda added joy! ;-) Thanks. Cheers!

slg8473

@Boatnmaniac A bunch of us owe you a drink of your choice, thanks! Now I just have to call Vanguard to recover my old ALV Pershing account number for my Roth IRA account unless there is a way to recover it on the new Vanguard site? I know it was there on the old website for years but I think its no longer displayed?

Jim_Harman

@slg8473 If the old Pershing number was what was used for Direct Connect before the outage, you should be able to restore a backup from before Feb. 21 and get it from the Account Details, then switch back to your current file.

In case this happens again, note both the old and new numbers in the Comments section of the Account Details.

Mark1104

MY TRANSATIONS JUST DOWNLOADED!

The error appears to be resolved!

tfhoughton

Yep..…I just downloaded three accounts. Looking good. Fingers crossed that it is fixed.

conwaynyc

I first tried OSU and it downloaded very quickly - one account was not syncing. I started to deactivate : reinstall but decided to go to a 2/13 backup and go from there. That worked and included the missing account. As mentioned earlier: going to a backup earlier than 2/20 works pretty well.

AlexisoftheShire

Vanguard OSU downloaded just fine this morning via direct connect All up-to-date and accurate. FYI.

Pinot83

OSU ran without errors. Did not have to deactivate and reopen accounts. No new transactions to download which is correct, but also no duplicates of those I had downloaded manually since the problem occurred.

RDA

It appears OSU is working again. But when I attempt to enable the one account I disabled, it only provides SIMPLE tracking method. Nothing I do allows me to enable COMPLETE tracking method. Quicken Team…any suggestions or answers?

RDA

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20480027#Comment_20480027

This helped me, thanks! It again connected the disabled account using the SIMPLE tracking method, but the option to change to COMPLETE was at last enabled.

AndrewQ

I posted a few posts above I had the same problem and I could not figure out how to do it.

According to a help, you could supposedly edit the preferences investment settings and you could then switch it off, but I never found the setting for doing that other than the one that just says on new accounts make it simple.

What I ended up doing was restoring from my last good backup and lo and behold, everything was okay at that point. Hopefully you have a recent backup?

(As a matter of course, every time I exit Quicken, I manually make a backup to another hard drive in my systemł.

Albert

It worked for me too

Hondo

It works!

LittleMasti

Its working now - Saturday 8th March, 7 am est. I am using a Mac. Vanguard is one of the nation’s largest financial institutions, but when it comes to technology adoption, they are not at par with Fidelity or Charles Schwab.

RalphC

I can confirm that the Vanguard connection issue appears to be resolved.

Frank F

I deactivated account so when I tried to reactivate all went well then when it asked me to link my account, the numbers on my account did not match to any of the choices. Checked my account numbers numerous times. Must be missing something easy?

Bob_L

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20480094#Comment_20480094

You are most likely seeing the last 4 of old Pershing Brokerage account numbers (Started with 44v, 43V,etc.) that you will not recognize. Restore an old backup to a copy so that you can retrieve those complete numbers. This will allow you to match them to the proper account. Put those numbers in your account detail notes in case it happens again.

Frank F

Just an FYI - I set up a test Quicken account to see if the holdings in the accounts were the same, and though the account numbers did not match - the accounts were a match - so I set up the account in my portfolio and everything went fine. Still wondering why account numbers don't match - but it works, so I'll get over it. 😀

Boatnmaniac

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/comment/20480088#Comment_20480088

Do your account holdings and cash balance match what Vangaurd says you have? I ask because whatever was downloaded while your account was set to Simple before you switched back to Complete will not include any securities transactions….just the total shares held.

A fast way to check:

Account Register > upper right Gear icon > Reconcile Shares: You will get a popup telling you whether or not there is a shares quantity issue and, if there is an issue, what the shares quantity issue is.
Account Register > click on Cash Balance below the register and on the right: You will get a popup showing what the cash balance in Quicken is and what the cash balance is as reported by Vanguard.

If no issues are identified (which I suspect will be the case): Scroll through the register from today's date back to the date of your last transactions download before this DC download issue began. Do you see any Add Shares or Remove Shares transactions? If so, this is what Quicken does when switching back from Simple to Complete. Since Simple does not download any shares transactions, just the shares count, Quicken will automatically enter Add Shares or Remove Shares transactions when switching back to Complete to compensate for the missing transactions.

If you find Add or Remove Shares transactions you will need to decide what to do about it. There are several options and it is a personal choice as to which path to take.

Option 1: The easiest thing to do is nothing. Just leave it as is. But this means your transactions history in the register and in Quicken will not be accurate (i.e., missing specific transactions) and your cost basis for affected securities might not be accurate.
Option 2: Restore a backed up data file dated from just before this DC issue occurred. Then run OSU with that. Or, if needed, do Reset Account or Deactivate followed by Add Account and selecting Advanced Options to ensure you can select the Direct Connect option. If you don't use Advanced Options and select Direct Connect your account might be wrongly set up with Simple Investing so you'll have to start this process all over, again. Just note that this option means transactions from other non-Vanguard accounts will need to be downloaded, again, since they will be missing in that restored backup file.
Option 3: Backup the data file. Then delete the Add Shares or Remove Shares transactions and then manually enter the missing transactions. You'll need to get the missing transactions from your online Vanguard account. If you do not have many missing transactions to be entered, this might be the simplest, fastest and least disruptive way to resolve the issue.
Option 4: The same as Option 3 but instead of manually entering the missing transactions, manually download and import a QFX file from your online account with the specific date range of the missing transactions. This might be a good option if there are a lot of missing transactions.

If I were in your shoes, I would most likely select Option 2.

Barry Pritchard

3/8/25 - 0830 CT - I just had success downloading my Vanguard transactions using the action button (gear) at the top left of my account screen.

Transactions matched earlier transactions I had manually entered and one new sell and transfer.

Windows 10, up to date.

JAJBM

today is 3/8/25 - still getting OL-295-A msg from Vanguard on Quicken Classic.

FrZpd7843

Hard to believe that Vanguard would find it acceptable to switch the Quicken interface from complex to simple, suppressing the ability to see a normal investment register with the entire history of transactions. I delinked my vanguard accounts from quicken so I could switch back to complex view. For now I will continue to login to Vanguard and download transactions from the "Activity" page.